REGENERATIVE MEDICINE NEURAL ENGINEERING MUSCULOSKELETAL CARDIOVASCULAR BIOMATERIALS

Trinity Centre for BioEngineering News Summer 2013

TRINITY CENTRE FOR BIOENGINEERING

Directors Message

Welcome to the summer newsletter of the Trinity Centre for Bioengineering. The past few

months have again been a very productive period for the PIs, postdoctoral researchers and

students associated with the Centre. Details of all our recent outputs and activities can be

found below, but I’d like to highlight just a few of them here.

Firstly, I’d like to welcome two new PIs to the Centre - Prof Sally-Ann Cryan from the

School of Pharmacy in the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and Prof Martin Burke from

the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering in Trinity College Dublin. In

addition, we have also had 15 new clinical PIs join the Centre over the past few months.

These are clinicians who are already working closely with PIs in the TCBE – further details

can be found at http://www.tcd.ie/bioengineering/people/investigators/. These new PIs

and Clinical PIs bring a unique set of skills and expertise to the Centre, and I have no doubt

that their presence will enhance our overall capabilities and our ability to deliver on our

core mission of promoting and facilitating research and education in Bioengineering and

related disciplines, and to ensure this research finds its way into the clinic in order to

improve patient care.

Secondly, I’m happy to announce that the Advanced Materials and BioEngineering

Research Centre (AMBER), an initiative put together by PIs in CRANN and the TCBE,

formally commenced this summer. The official launch of this new Science Foundation

Ireland funded Research Centre will be on the 24th of October. Further details to follow.

Finally, I’d like to congratulate Dr Garry Duffy on his recent Fulbright Award and Prof

Ciaran Simms who was recently appointed the Director of Undergraduate Teaching and

Learning in the School of Engineering in TCD.

I hope you enjoy reading the newsletter.

In this issue:

• Directors Message

• Awards

• Welcome to new TCBE researchers

• Media Coverage

• Publications

• Events, Seminars & Conferences

• Current opportunities

REGENERATIVE MEDICINE NEURAL ENGINEEING BIOMATERIALS MUSCULOSKELETAL CARDIOVASCULAR

Pictured above from left to right are Prof. Fergal O'Brien, Dr. Garry Duffy and Prof. Clive Lee from the RCSI Department of Anatomy at the 2013 Fullbright Awards Ceremony held in Dublin Castle.

On July 12th, Dr. Garry Duffy of the Tissue Engineering Research Group was presented with a prestigious Fullbright Award. Fulbright Awards are given annually by the Irish and U.S. governments and provide Irish students, scholars, and professionals with the opportunity to study, lecture, and research at top universities and institutions throughout the United States. With this award, Dr. Duffy will undertake research on developing restorative therapies for acute myocardial infarctions at Harvard University. What makes this award even more commendable for Dr. Duffy is that this is the second time he has been granted a Fullbright Award, with his first he carried out research in cardiovascular tissue engineering and stem cell biology at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

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Scholarship Awards TCBE PI’s, Dr. Ciaran Simms and Dr. Paula Murphy were successful in gaining a new Ph.D. scholarship under the TCD engineering E3 scheme. The title of the project is “Passive skeletal muscle form and function: Engineering insights from Zoology” Dr. Ciaran Simms was also successful in getting a Ph.D. scholarship from TCD and the Chinese Scholarship Council. Student Guibing Li from China will commence his Ph.D. on vehicle shape optimisation for pedestrian protection in September.

Dr. Garry Duffy, Principal Investigator in Trinity Centre for Bioengineering, receives second Fulbright Scholar Award.

Awards New People

Welcome to our new Principal Investigators, Professor Sally Ann Cryan and Dr. Martin Burke.

Professor Sally-Ann Cryan is currently Senior Lecturer and Research Convenor for the School of Pharmacy, at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI), Dublin. She was a founding member and PI of the SFI-funded Irish Drug Delivery Network

(IDDN). Dr Cryan is a reviewer for 16 scientific journals and 5 international research funding agencies . She has organised and/or chaired scientific sessions at the top conferences in her field including the Annual Meetings of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists (AAPS) and the Controlled Release Society (CRS) and is currently a Member of Scientific Advisory Board of Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Lung Vascular Research.

development of a dry-electrode electrocardiogram (ECG) recording system for ambulatory diagnostic purposes as well as precision characterisation and simulation of the ECG signal. He has published in a range of international journals and conference proceedings.

Professor Martin Burke is an Associate Professor in the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering in Trinity College and has served two terms as Head of Department. His research interests lie in biomedical instrumentation and applications. His current work includes

derived stem cells for functional cartilage tissue engineering”. With a research background in biomaterials and stem cells based musculoskeletal tissue engineering, he received his PhD in Supramolecular Chemistry from University of Madras, India. He completed two postdoctoral trainings in cartilage and bone tissue engineering at Kaohsiung Medical University, Taiwan and Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of California, Davis, USA. He has authored or co-authored 2 book chapters, 4 issued patents, 7 peer reviewed journal papers and over 40 international peer reviewed conference abstracts and presentations.

Dr. Rajalakshmanan Eswaramoorthy recently joined Dr. Daniel J Kelly research team focusing on “Development of decellularized bioactive scaffolds and novel isolation technique of inter-patellar fat pad

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Media Coverage

Headline: New Innovator: Theracoll Publication: Irish Times Date: Monday 9 July 2013

Getting bone and its surrounding tissue to regenerate following a serious trauma such as a major fracture or the removal of a large tumour, has long been a challenge for medical researchers. Now the Tissue Engineering Research Group at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland has developed a new technology that can do both. The multidisciplinary team, led by Prof Fergal O’Brien, has developed TheraColl, a porous, collagen-based scaffold (that looks like a sponge) which is implanted into the bone defect to enhance bone regeneration. It does so by releasing two drugs from micro particles contained within the scaffold that both promote the growth of blood vessels and help repair the bone defect. “The simultaneous delivery of both growth factors has a synergistic effect leading to an enhanced healing rate in a significantly shorter time,” O’Brien says. “The developing field of tissue engineering aims to regenerate damaged tissues by using cells from the patient combined with highly porous scaffolds that act as templates for tissue regeneration. These scaffolds overcome two problems related to bone tissue regeneration: they enhance blood vessel formation and they increase and accelerate the bone formation process.” O’Brien(pictured below) , a former Fulbright Scholar, began in-depth research into this field 10 years ago following his return from the US where he had been working in the area of orthopaedic tissue engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard Medical School. His initial funding came from Science Foundation Ireland.

The project to develop TheraColl into a commercially viable product began in 2008 and has cost approximately €400,000 to date. The project has been supported by Enterprise Ireland and the patent protected technology is now ready for sale. O’Brien says the most likely route to market is through licensing the technology. While TheraColl is currently focused on bone problems O’Brien says the beauty of the scaffold platform is that it can be applied to the regeneration of other tissues. For example, it also has potential in the area of cartilage and cardiac repair. “Cartilage is very challenging because it has no vascular structure and no capacity to regenerate,” O’Brien says. “But we can use the scaffold to deliver any number of alternative growth factors depending on the situation. In the case of cartilage this would be of benefit to people with osteoarthritis. In a cardiac setting it could be used to regenerate damaged heart-wall tissue. We can tailor both the type of drugs to be used and the rate at which they are released. This technology draws on the expertise of a number of disciplines from bio-engineering, life sciences and pharmacy as well as surgeons who can tell us what they need in a clinical setting.” __________________________________________ TCBE Neural Engineering researcher Viliam Rapcan was featured on the cover of the TCD Donor Report Spring 2013.

Takaza, M, Moerman K, Simms CK, “Passive Skeletal Muscle Response to Impact Loading: Experimental testing and inverse modelling” in press JMBBM, April 2013.

Amato G, O'Brien F, Ghosh B, Simms CK, “Title: Multibody modelling of a TB31 and a TB32 crash test with vertical portable concrete barriers: Model verification and sensitivity analysis” in press, IMechE Journal of Multibody Dynamics, March 2013.

Amato G, O’Brien F, Ghosh B, Williams, G, Simms CK, “Multibody modelling of gabion beams for impact applications”, in press Journal of Crashworthiness, February 2013.

Gindre J, Takaza M, Moerman K, Simms CK, A Structural Model of Passive Skeletal Muscle shows Two Reinforcement Processes in Resisting Deformation, in press JMBBM, February 2013.

Mesallati, T., Buckley, C.T., Kelly, D.J. A comparison of self-assembly and hydrogel encapsulation as a means to engineer functional cartilaginous grafts using culture expanded chondrocytes. Tissue Engineering, Part C (in press).

Steward, A.J., Wagner, D.R., Kelly, D.J. A role for integrin binding and microtubule reorganization in mesenchymal stem cell mechanotransduction. Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials (in press).

Thorpe, S.D., Nagel, T., Carroll, S.F., Kelly, D.J. Modulating gradients in regulatory signals within mesenchymal stem cell seeded hydrogels: A novel strategy to engineer zonal articular cartilage. PLoS One, 8(4): e60764, 2013.

Burke, D., Dishowitz, M., Sweetwyne, M., Miedel, E., Hankenson, K.D., Kelly, D.J. The role of oxygen as a regulator of stem cell fate during fracture repair in tsp2-null mice. Journal of Orthopaedic Research (in press).

Kelly SP, Vanegas MI, Schroeder CE, Lalor EC.

The cruciform model of striate generation of the early VEP, re-illustrated, not revoked: A reply to Ales et al. (2013). Neuroimage. 2013 Jun 2;82C:154-159.

The cruciform model of striate generation of the early VEP, re-illustrated, not revoked: A reply to Ales et al. (2013). Kelly SP, Vanegas MI, Schroeder CE, Lalor EC. Neuroimage. 2013 Jun 2;82C:154-159.

Frey HP, Molholm S, Lalor EC, Russo NN, Foxe JJ Atypical cortical representation of peripheral visual space in children with an autism spectrum disorder. Eur J Neurosci. 2013 Jul;38(1):2125-38.

Widaa,A. Brennan,O. O’Gorman, D.M. O’Brien, F.J. The osteogenic potential of the marine-derived multi-mineral formula aquamin is enhanced by the presence of vitamin D 2013 Phytotherapy Research Article in Press

Frey HP, Molholm S, Lalor EC, Russo NN, Foxe JJAtypical cortical representation of peripheral visual space in children with an autism spectrum disorder.. Eur J Neurosci. 2013 Jul;38(1):2125-38.

Publications

Nagel, T., Kelly, D.J. Altering the swelling pressures within in vitro engineered cartilage is predicted to modulate the configuration of the collagen network and hence improve tissue mechanical properties. Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials (in press).

Liu, Y., Buckley, C.T., Mulhall, K.J., Kelly, D.J. Combining BMP-6, TGF-β3 and hydrostatic pressure stimulation enhances the functional development of cartilage tissues engineered using human infrapatellar fat pad derived stem cells. Biomaterials Science (in press).

Ahearne, M., Kelly, D.J. A comparison of fibrin, agarose and gellan gum hydrogels as carriers of stem cells and growth factor delivery microspheres for cartilage regeneration. Biomedical Materials (in press).

Cilla, M., Pena, E., Martınez, M.A., Kelly, D.J. Comparison of the vulnerability risk for positive versus negative atheroma plaque morphology. Journal of Biomechanics (in press).

Cochlear implant artifact attenuation in late auditory evoked potentials: A single channel approach Hearing Research, Volume 302, August 2013, Pages 84-95 Myles Mc Laughlin, Alejandro Lopez Valdes, Richard B. Reilly, Fan-Gang Zeng

Science versus design; comparable, contrastive or conducive? Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials, Volume 21, May 2013, Pages 195-201 Gijsbertus J. Verkerke, Eduard B. van der Houwen, Anton A. Broekhuis, Jiri Bursa, Gerardo Catapano, Paul McCullagh, Khosrow Mottaghy, Peter Niederer, Richard Reilly, Vladimir Rogalewicz, Patrick Segers, Nico Verdonschot

K.M. Coghlan, L.T. Breen, Z. Martin, S. O'Neill, P. Madhaven, D. Moore, B.P. Murphy An Experimental Study to Determine the Optimal Access Route for Renal Artery Interventions European Journal of Vascular and Endovascular Surgery, Volume 46, Issue 2, August 2013, Pages 236-241

Holland, J.C., Brennan, O., Kennedy, O.D., Mahony, N.J., Rackard, S., O'Brien, F.J., Lee, T.C.Examination of osteoarthritis and subchondral bone alterations within the stifle joint of an ovariectomised ovine model Journal of Anatomy 222 (6) , pp. 588-597

Raftery, R., O’Brien, F.J., Cryan, S-A. Chitosan for gene delivery and orthopedic tissue engineering applications 2013 Molecules 18 (5) , pp. 5611-5647

Matsiko, A. Levingstone, T.J. O’Brien, F.J. Advanced strategies for articular cartilage defect repair 2013 Materials 6 (2) , pp. 637-668

McCoy, Ryan J. Orchestrating Osteogenic Differentiation of Mesenchymal Stem Cells – Identification of Placental Growth Factor as a Mechanosensitive

Widaa, Amro Ph.D1, Watters, Karen M. Ph.D3, Wuerstle, Maximilian4, Stallings, Ray L. Gene with a Pro-osteogenic Role Eng.D1,2. Ph.D3, Duffy, Garry P. Ph.D1,2, O’Brien, Fergal J. Ph.D1,2 STEM CELLS

TCBE Seminars Perception of True Linear Self-Motion using Vestibular Stimulation in Humans: A Mathematical Electrophysiological Analysis Hugh Nolan, July 2013 Multidisciplinary research into bone mechanobiology during normal physiology, disease and to develop bone tissue regeneration strategies Laoise McNamara, Ph.D. National University of Ireland Galway June 2013 Development of adult mesenchymal stem cell-based tissue engineering strategies for intervertebral disc regeneration Prof. Judith Hoyland, Centre for Regenerative Medicine, The University of Manchester, May 2013 Objective Rating Scales for Focal Dystonias David A. Peterson, Ph.D. University of California, San Diego Salk Institute for Biological Studies , May 2013 Mesenchymal Stem Cell Therapy: Mechanism of Action and Host Response Frank Barry PhD, Professor of Cellular Therapy, Director, National Centre for Biomedical Engineering Science, Scientific Director, Regenerative Medicine Institute, National University of Ireland Galway, April 2013

__________________________________ TCBE Invited Talks “Tissue Engineering Articular Cartilage and Bone with Form and Function”. Dr. Daniel Kelly, Keynote Speaker, Anatomical Society Summer Meeting, Dublin, Ireland, July 4-5, 2013.

TRINITY CENTRE FOR BIOENGINEERING Events, Seminars & Conferences

TRINITY CENTRE FOR BIOENGINEERING

TCBE Invited Talks “Stem cells for articular cartilage and joint repair – Engineering the regenerative environment.” Dr. Daniel Kelly, Bioengineering Seminar Series, Politecnico di Milano, Thursday, April 18, 2013. Professor Richard Reilly presented on research in ageing at a recent meeting of the European Research Area Committee. The meeting, held as part of Irelands EU presidency, was hosted by TILDA and Trinity EngAGE - Centre for Research in Ageing at the request of Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation.

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TCBE researcher Martin Holmes wins 3rd place prize at Sir Bernard Crossland Symposium The Sir Bernard Crossland Symposium is a competition held annually for postgraduate students who have completed 12-18 months of research in a field related to Mechanical Engineering at Universities in Ireland. Each University puts forward one student for this event and this year TCBE PhD student Martin Holmes was chosen to represent TCD. Eight students presented to the Council of Professors of Mechanical Engineering. Martin won the award for 3rd best presentation/paper. Pictured below is Martin with the Council of Professors after the symposium.

International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, Japan Members of Professor Richard Reilly’s Neural Engineering lab attended the 35th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society, which was held in Osaka, Japan from July 3rd- 7th. Pictured below are PhD students Isabelle Killane, Martin Holmes and Alejandro Lopez Valdes who attended. Isabelle presented two papers on her research: 1. 'Measurement of Attention during Movement: Acquisition of Ambulatory EEG and Cognitive Performance from Healthy Young Adults' and 2. 'Variance Between Walking Speed and Neuropsychological Test Scores During Three Gait Tasks Across The Irish Longitudinal Study on Aging (TILDA) Dataset'.

Conferences attended Researchers in TCBE presented their research at conferences all over the world this summer from Japan to Turkey to the United States.

Alejandro presented his research in a paper entitled 'Auditory Mismatch Negativity in Cochlear Implant Users: A Window to Spectral Discrimination‘. Martin presented two papers on his research: 1. 'An acoustic method of automatically evaluating patient inhaler technique' and 2. 'Using acoustics to estimate inspiratory flow rate and drug removed from a dry powder inhaler'.

Dr. Lalor presented his research at an invited session on the theme of Neural Engineering in Speech and Hearing. The title of his presentation was: 'The Effects of Attention and Visual Input on the Representation of Natural Speech in EEG'.

PhD student Mr Cian O’Leary was awarded second Place in the poster competition at the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS)-European Conference in Istanbul, Turkey. This was a great achievement given the fact that TERMIS-EU is one of the largest conferences in its field with over 750 scientists attending from around the world.

TRINITY CENTRE FOR BIOENGINEERING

Events, Seminars & Conferences

Henrique Almeida, a PhD student in Dr. Daniel Kellys Lab (pictured above) wrote about his experience of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS)-European Conference : “It was a great pleasure to be in beautiful Istanbul representing Trinity for TERMIS-EU-2013 conference. More than 750 Tissue Engineering scientists from around the World were present in this conference. Despite the difficult political and social circumstances in Turkey, before and during the conference, everything went well and as planned. It was an excellent opportunity to learn and create new scientific connections with other researchers. The title of my poster presentation was: “The composition and architecture of cartilage ECM derived scaffolds regulates stem cell infiltration and their chondrogenic differentiation”. I was there with Dr. Gráinne Cunniffe, Olivier Guillaume and Masooma Naqvi (a great group of people).”

Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS)-European Conference

ASME 2013 Summer Bioengineering Conference Eamon Sheehy gave a podium presentation entitled 'Towards Engineering Whole Bones via Endochondral Ossification' in the Tissue Engineering I session of the ASME 2013 Summer Bioengineering Conference in Sunriver Resort, Sunriver, Oregon, USA. The conference consisted of a very broad spectrum of talks from the field of Bioengineering with many of the top US labs attending and presenting.

Events, Seminars & Conferences

Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop, Colorado, USA

Dr. Ed Lalor, TCBE PI and two PhD students Mick Cross and James O’Sullivan attended the Neuromorphic Cognition Engineering Workshop in Telluride, Colorado, USA from the 30th June to the 20th July, 2013. Neuromorphic engineering is a field aimed at designing and fabricating artificial neural systems whose organizing principles are based on those of biological nervous systems. Over the past 16 years, this research community has focused on the understanding of low-level sensory processing and systems infrastructure with efforts now expanding to apply this knowledge and infrastructure to addressing higher-level problems in perception, cognition, and learning. The workshop, which is funded primarily by the US National Science Foundation, brings together scientists and engineers from all over the world to engage in several multidisciplinary, hands-on projects for three weeks each year. Human Cognition Group 2013 Dr. Ed Lalor joined Professor Shihab Shamma (University of Maryland/ENS Paris), Dr Macolm Slaney (Microsoft Research) and Professor Barbara Shinn-Cunningham (Boston University) as a topic leader for a project entitled “Human Cognition: Decoding Perceived, Attended, Imagined Acoustic Events and Human-Robot Interfaces”. Mick and James joined a team of exceptional international students and postdocs in trying to develop this extremely ambitious project. They met with significant success and have returned to TCBE with many new ideas, new analysis techniques and new active collaborations. A full-scale follow-up laboratory experiment is already underway in Dr Lalor’s lab. Happily all three TCBE participants returned unscathed after several close run-ins with the local bear population while playing disc golf in the Rockies!

Please visit our website for more information on current opportunities in TCBE.

Position: Postdoctoral Research Fellow Project Title: Development of a novel bioinspired fibre reinforced hydrogel that recapitulates developmental processes to regenerate the bone-ligament interface Start Date: October 2013 (preferred). E-mail your CV to Dr. Daniel Kelly (kellyd9@tcd.ie). Position: PhD studentship Project Title: A tissue engineered biological joint replacement prosthesis for the treatment of degenerative joint disease Start Date: September 2013 (preferred). E-mail your CV to Dr. Daniel Kelly (kellyd9@tcd.ie).

Position: PhD studentship Project Title: Early Predictors of Speech Perception and Performance in Cochlear Implant Users Start Date: Ocober2013 Please e-mail tcbe@tcd.ie Position: PhD studentship Project Title: Passive skeletal muscle form and function: Engineering insights from Zoology Start Date: Ocober2013 . E-mail tcbe@tcd.ie

Current Opportunities

Contact us Trinity Centre for Bioengineering Trinity Biomedical Sciences Institute, Trinity College Dublin, 152-160 Pearse Street, Dublin 2 Tel: +353-1-8964214 Email: tcbe@tcd.ie Website: www.tcd.ie/bioengineering